{"id":33938,"date":"2023-09-11T10:14:44","date_gmt":"2023-09-11T17:14:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=33938"},"modified":"2025-05-29T06:28:29","modified_gmt":"2025-05-29T13:28:29","slug":"22-years-later","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=33938","title":{"rendered":"22 YEARS LATER"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Unknown\"<\/a>I was 17 the day Oswald shot JFK, 21 the year RFK and MLK were killed, 39 when the Challenger blew up. On the morning of September 11, 2001, I was 54.<\/p>\n

The wounds these events inflicted felt like they’d never heal. Somehow, though, the assassinations faded into history. Challenger, too. As for 9\/11, well, it’s getting there. Pulling out of Afghanistan, that bottomless pit of evil and corruption, closed the chapter for many Americans.<\/p>\n

It’s not quite closed for me. Twenty-two years on, one scar’s still tender to the touch: the failure of our intelligence agencies and leadership to prevent an attack anyone could have seen coming (and many did, including me). Here’s an excerpt from a post I wrote in February 2014<\/a><\/strong>:<\/p>\n

In 1995 a bomb went off prematurely in a Manila apartment and Philippine authorities uncovered what came to be known as the Bojinka Plot<\/a><\/strong>. An Islamist terrorist named Ramzi Yousef, assisted by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, planned to kill the Pope during a visit to the Philippines, plant bombs on 11 jet airliners, and hijack a 12th airliner in order to fly it into CIA headquarters in Virginia.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not like the Bojinka Plot wasn\u2019t in the news. I knew about it at the time; so did everyone who was paying attention. The part that got my attention was the terrorists\u2019 plan to hijack an airliner and use it as a flying bomb against a ground target in the USA. That was a new and scary terrorist tactic. My first thought was \u201cWhat if they try that flying-airliners-into-buildings trick again some day?\u201d<\/p>\n

That was in 1995, and I was just some dumb shit reading about Bojinka in the papers. We pay people to watch for plots like this and take action to prevent their execution. But just a few years later terrorists led by the very same Khalid Sheikh Mohammed<\/em> hijacked four airliners in the USA and carried out the 9\/11 attacks. What did President George W. Bush have to say afterward? C\u2019mon, repeat it with me:<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hard to envision a plot so devious as the one that they pulled off on 9\/11,\u201d Bush said in a January interview with NBC\u2019s Tom Brokaw. \u201cNever did we realize that the enemy was so well organized.\u201d<\/p>\n

Well, some of us envisioned it. Some of us realized it. \u2026 I\u2019m not a 9\/11 truther, but all this is verifiable fact. We did know. We were warned. And we did nothing.<\/p>\n

Have we gotten better at predicting and heading off terrorist attacks? I\u2019d like to think so, and evidence suggests we\u2019ve foiled many planned attacks by foreign terrorists<\/a><\/strong>. Domestic terrorism, though? Maybe, but we badly fumbled the Capitol insurrection of January 6, 2021. Of course the then-leader of our government orchestrated that attack and knee-capped military and intelligence agencies to keep them from getting in the way, so maybe we can take a Mulligan on that one.<\/p>\n

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So maybe I’ll lighten things up a bit with some hot takes:<\/p>\n

Don’t know about you, but my social media feeds are full of “abandoned places” posts with photos of aircraft boneyards, shuttered amusement parks, empty schools, hospitals, lighthouses, crumbling villas. I always wonder if people actually try to find and explore these sites. Because nothing’s ever really abandoned. Somebody or something owns these places. And they don’t want you crawling around in them.<\/p>\n

A1 Steak Sauce lovers, I welcome your hate:<\/p>\n

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I always figured that stuff was meant to mask the flavor and smell of rotting meat in the days before refrigeration, so 1862 fits. Can't believe people actually like it. https:\/\/t.co\/f88inhNjV5<\/a><\/p>\n

— Paul Woodford (@paulwoodford) September 10, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n